Press-Kit

«It's time to give the people of Cambodia a voice again»

For over 40 years, Cambodia’s cultural heritage was silenced. Now, Smiling Gecko is bringing it back. With The Gong, a visionary cultural center, and Gong Studios, a state-of-the-art recording space, we are restoring music, art, and expression to a nation that lost so much. Supported by Hollywood director Marc Forster, The Gong is a place of creativity, connection, and revival.

«The cultural building ‘The Gong’ offers the best technical and aesthetic possibilities to give free rein to any musical inspiration and to concentrate fully on the music in the midst of Cambodia’s nature.
The whole Smiling Gecko campus envelops you in a certain magic that is literally hand-made, not only by the intelligent structure, but also by all the helping hands and good souls on site.»

LUISA IMORDE
German Pianist

«The ability to do a live performance in such an outstanding location and have it filmed with a professional multicamera setup while also have it multitrack-recorded, mixed and live-streamed over the internet, is a really unique opportunity for every artist, event management and company looking to provide an experience extraordinnaire. There is simply no other location on this planet that has such a vibe and that level of infrastructure at the same time.»

PHILIPP SCHWEIDLER
Director Strategy, toniq.ch

«A spacious control room with unobtrusive “state of the art” technology, four recording rooms with different acoustics, a generous selection of first-class microphones that cover every style of music… and all this embedded in inspiring architecture: a dream for every artist and also for music producers!»

WALTER ROHRBACH
Musician and Sound Engineer, walter-rohrbach.ch

Award

The NGO “Smiling Gecko” pursues a holistic approach to improve the living conditions of rural society in Cambodia. Music, an integral part of every society, was wiped out under the Khmer Rouge and disregarded thereafter. We support SG on all matters «Sound» – to provide opportunities for local creatives and for the society to prosper as a whole.